Tag: Staff Directory WordPress Plugin

No doubt you’ve already heard that people generally tend to buy from businesses they already know, like and trust.

If you are searching for quicker, simpler and cost-effective ideas to sell more products online or increase user interaction with your site, then help prospects get to know, like and trust your business better.

Adding a directory of employees or faculty members to your site can help boost your credibility online and get more prospects considering using your services.

In this step-by-step tutorial, we explain how to create and add an updatable list of staff or faculty members to your website using a free plugin.

WordPress Plugin Tutorial: How To Add An Employee List Directory In WordPress

In this tutorial, we will install, activate and configure a free plugin called Simple Staff List.

Simple Staff List WordPress Plugin

(Simple Staff List – WordPress Plugin)

Simple Staff List lets you employee (you could also use it to display faculty, etc.).

First, let’s install and activate the Simple Staff List plugin.

Log into your dashboard and from the admin menu section, choose Plugins > Add New …

(Plugins Menu – Add New)

In the Plugins area, search for “simple staff plugin”. This will bring up the Simple Staff Plugin in your plugin search results.

Click on the Install Now button …

(WordPress Plugins  – plugin search results)

Activate the plugin …

(Activate plugin)

After the plugin has been installed and activated, you will see that a new menu will appear in your main WP admin menu called Staff Members …

(Staff Members menu)

All of the settings for the Simple Staff List plugin are configured and managed from the Staff Members menu.

Simple Staff List – Plugin Configuration

Depending on how many people are in your business and how you want to structure your directory, you can begin to add new staff entries after installing the plugin, or create several groups (i.e. categories) to assign yourstaff into.

Staff Members – Groups

Let’s configure your categories. From your WP dashboard menu, choose Staff Members > Groups …

(Staff Members Menu – Groups)

This opens up the Groups settings area …

(Groups area)

Note: Adding groups works in the same way as adding WordPress categories …

(Groups work like categories)

Add new groups by typing in the following information:

1. Group Name – Enter your category name here
2. Slug – Enter the URL-friendly version of your category name. Note: make sure that all letters are in lower case and use hyphens instead of spaces.
3. Parent – Use this section if you plan to set up nested categories
4. Description – Enter the category description
5. Click the Add New Group button when done to set up a new group name …

(Groups settings area)

If you are a medium to large organization, the ability to create categories can be very useful. For example, you can create groups for partners, project teams, faculties, etc.

Create as many categories and nested categories as you need by adding new Groups and then using the Parent drop-down menu to build a directory hierarchy …

(Nested groups)

Remember to click on the Add New Group button after creating new items …

To change or reassign Groups for an item, hover over a category title and click on the Edit link …

The item will display in the Edit Group page. Select a new parent group category from the Parent dropdown menu …

(Edit Group screen)

Click the Update button when done …

To change your Group name or slug, hover over the group name and select Quick Edit …

Click Update Group to save your changes …

Add as many categories as you need to until you have created your directory structure …

You can add as many nested groups as you like …

(Add nested categories your directory)

Once you are done setting up your groups, you can start adding your people to your directory.

Staff Members – Add New

In your admin menu, click on Staff Members > Add New …

(Staff Members Menu – Add New)

The Add New Staff Member screen …

(Add New Staff Member settings area)

This page provides you with an easy-to-use interface for adding your staff member profile and includes the following fields:

Name Section (1)

• Name: The employee’s name
• Slug: Modify the slug for your employee if required (you will see this section after your first save).

Staff Photo Section (2)

• Photo: Add a photo here

Staff Member Info Section (3)

• Position: Add the person’s role
• Email: Type in your staff member’s email address
• Phone Number: Type in your employee’s phone number
• Facebook URL: Type your company’s Facebook address into this field (note: use the full URL, e.g. http://www.facebook.com/username)
• Twitter URL: Type your company’s Twitter username into this field (note: only enter the username, not the full twitter URL)

Staff Member Bio Section (4)

• Staff Member Bio: Add a profile description for your employees here. This uses the WordPress Text Editor, so you can add formatting to the content entered in this section.

Groups Section (5)

• Groups: You can assign a staff or team member to a specific group (see above to learn how to set up your groups).

If you click on the Screen Options tab …

(Screen options)

You will see options to enable additional page settings …

(Enable additional fields in screen options)

Now that you know what each section does, enter each employee’s details …

(Add New Staff Member fields)

Once you have entered your staff member’s details, assign your new entry to a directory group in the Groups box located in your sidebar …

(Groups feature)

Note: If you did not set up your directory groups before starting to add new staff members, you can add a new group in this screen by clicking on Groups > + Add New Group …

(Groups > + Add New Group feature)

A field will display allowing you to create a new group name, with a drop-down menu that lets you assign your new entry to a parent group. Enter your new group and click on the Add New Group button …

Your new directory category will be added. Remember to tick the checkbox to assign your staff member to the group …

(New group added)

Note: Groups cannot be edited when new employee details are being added or modified. To edit a group item, go to the Groups section of the plugin’s settings (see “Groups” section of the tutorial above for details).

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After entering your team member’s details, click the Publish button …

Click View Post …

To update your member profile, click on the Edit Staff Member link in your WordPress admin toolbar …

(Edit Staff Member link – WordPress admin toolbar)

For a detailed step-by-step tutorial about using the dashboard admin toolbar , go here:

• Using The WP Control Panel

Note: If you have set up groups and get ’page not found’ errors like the one shown below, check that you have configured your permalinks correctly …

(Check your permalinks if you get a page error)

We have written a detailed tutorial about using permalinks here:

• Changing Your WordPress Permalinks

Repeat the above process to continue adding more members to your employee or faculty directory.

Staff Members – All Staff Members

After you have entered all employee details into your directory, you can view and edit their details by selecting Staff Members > All Staff Members on the main admin menu …

(Staff Members Menu – All Staff Members)

This brings up a list with all your staff members and their details …

(Staff Members details list)

If you need to change individual entries, simply hover your mouse over their list name, and a menu will appear.

Click on Edit if you want to modify the Staff Bio, or Quick Edit to update details such as their name, slug, group, and publish status. You can also remove a list item from your staff directory by clicking on Trash, or view the entry on your site by selecting View …

(Edit Staff Members profile info)

If you have many names added to this section, your list can become unwieldy.

You can use the Search Staff Members search field to locate listing items if required …

(Search Staff Members search feature)

You can specify which fields to display in this screen. To hide or hide fields on your screen, click the Screen Options tab at the top of your page …

(Staff Members Screen Options)

Tick or untick the checkboxes to show or hide specific fields. You can also select how many staff members are shown per page. Click the Apply button when done to save your settings …

Staff Members – Order

Simple Staff List also features a drag-and-drop interface that lets you specify the order that your employee listings display on your directory page.

Click Staff Members > Order in the menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

To rearrange the order of your listings, click and drag the entry to its desired position …

(Rearrange staff listings using drag and drop)

Your list will be automatically reorganized …

(Reordered list entries)

After adding all staff details to your directory, the next step is to make the directory show on your site.

Staff Members – Order

Simple Staff List also features a drag-and-drop interface allowing you to specify the order that entries show on your directory pages.

Select Staff Members > Order on the menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Order)

To rearrange the order of your listings, click and drag the entry to the desired location …

(Rearrange listings using drag and drop)

Your staff list will automatically be reordered …

(Reordered list items)

After adding all staff listing details to the directory, the next step is to add the directory on your site.

Simple Staff List – Additional Notes

Simple Staff List also lets you edit the layout and style of your directory items using template tags and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).

Templates Menu

To customize the style and layout of your directory, select Staff Members > Templates from your menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Templates)

This opens the Templates page …

(Customize your directory template)

To customize your directory listings, reorganize any of the allowable template tags inside the [staff_loop] [/staff_loop] code.

For example, below is the Default Template …

(Default Plugin Template)

The This code will display your listing as shown below …

(Default Plugin Template Listing)

Notice that there are no Facebook or Twitter URLs showing in the above example. To make these fields appear in your directory, we will need to add the [staff-facebook] and [staff-twitter] tags to the template, as shown below …

(Use template tags to customize your listings page)

Here is what your staff list should now look like …

(Employee profiles with social media URLs)

Note: If you want to customize your directory listings but don’t want to mess around with CSS code and template tags or are unsure of what to do, please contact us for help.

Usage Menu

In addition to being able to customize your directory templates, the Simple Staff List plugin allows you to display your listings differently using modified shortcodes.

In your WordPress admin menu, select Staff Members >Usage …

(Staff Members Menu – Usage)

This brings up the Usage page …

(Usage shortcodes)

This screen lists all different shortcode variations allowed by the plugin.

For example, a useful variation you can choose to display only members belonging a specific group is the shortcode [simple-staff-list group=”group name”], (e.g.:[simple-staff-list group=”sales trainers”])

Or, you can display listings in ascending or descending order by adding the shortcode [simple-staff-list order=”ASC”] (ascending).

Options Menu

Click Staff Members >Options on the menu …

(Staff Members Menu – Options)

This brings up the Options screen …

(Simple Staff List – customizable options)

Here you can change some of the labels used in the plugin

Finally, you can also export your staff members info from the Tools > Export page …

(Export Staff Members information)

If you need plugin help or support, visit the plugin website and contact the plugin author.

Additional WordPress Plugins For Creating Simple Staff Directories

Simple Staff List is not the only plugin you can use. Here are a few other free WordPress plugins you can look at:

Modern Team Staff Directory

(Modern Team Staff Directory)

Modern Team Staff Directory helps you collect your team information and showcase it anywhere on your site in beautiful grids, columns and tables. This premium plugin features over a dozen presets and provides editors that make it easy to edit and update your directory.

(Modern Team Staff Directory – Responsive Templates)

Learn more here:

• Modern Team Staff Directory – WP Staff Directory Plugin

Staff Directory

(Staff Directory – Plugin For WordPress)

With the Staff Directory plugin, you can easily create a directory of staff/team/faculty members. The plugin supports staff categories and can be used for companies, teams, etc.

You can also set up custom fields …

(Custom Details Fields Screen. Screenshot source: plugin website)

More info:

• Staff Directory

Faculty And Staff Directory

(Faculty And Staff Directory – Plugin For WordPress)

The Faculty And Staff Directory plugin provides a simple and flexible faculty and staff directory for a small college or university.

The plugin also installs a widget that allows you to feature profiles in a widget area.

Go here to learn more:

• Faculty And Staff Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin

Company Directory

(Company Directory – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

With Company Directory, you can add your staff to your site. Different layouts are included, including list and table views, as well as fields like job title, email, phone, pic and bio, allowing you to present your company and capabilities.

Visitors can click through from your list, grid, and table views to learn more about each staff member in a customizable single view …

(Display your staff and faculty members in an easy to view format. Screenshot sourced from plugin website)

This plugin also uses a simple shortcode system.

Learn more here:

• Company Directory – Plugin For WordPress

Employee Spotlight

(Employee Spotlight – WordPress Staff Directory Plugin)

Employee Spotlight displays team members, founders or just one individual member of your team in a four-column circle grid page. This page can be easily created with a setup assistant upon plugin activation.

The Employee Spotlight pluginincludes two sidebar widgets which display featured and recent employees selected in the editor, plus two responsive views which adjust to the device screen size.

Detailed information about  each employee can be displayed in their own page, as well as in summary …

(Responsive layout with circle grid. Screenshot sourced from Employee Spotlight plugin website)

Learn more about this plugin here:

• Employee Spotlight – Plugin For WordPress

Staffer

(Staffer)

This plugin uses custom post types for employee management and supports the display of staff members via a shortcode, allowing you to easily create and manage an online staff directory …

(Staffer archive page. Screenshot sourced from Staffer plugin website)

Staffer works immediately with almost all WordPress themes, and also allows for custom template use and custom content wrappers.

For more details go here:

• Staffer

If the directory plugins listed above aren’t what you’re looking for, search the WordPress plugin directory or go online and search for:

• Add Staff Directory To WordPress
• WordPress Staff Directory Plugin
• WordPress Plugin Staff Directory
• Staff Plugin WordPress
• etc.

Congratulations! Now you know how to add a simple employee or team member directory to your WordPress site, so you can better showcase the people in your business, team, or organization.

Images used to portray sample staff members were sourced under creative commons license from pixabay.com

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